


Nightly Worries

by LastHope



Series: Shizayaweek 2016 [4]
Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Coffee Addiction, Established Relationship, Gen, Insecurities, Shizaya Week, Sleep Deprivation, sleep problems
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-17
Updated: 2016-04-17
Packaged: 2018-06-02 17:14:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6574990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LastHope/pseuds/LastHope
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The words haunt him nightly in his sleep to the point where he avoids it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nightly Worries

He hasn’t slept in five days. His left knee won’t stop shaking, and he’s just had his sixth cup of coffee in the past two hours. He thinks he’s gained the ability to hear colors, but the upside of this whatever-it-is is that he’s finished all of his work for the next week. And he doesn’t even _like_ coffee.

“Are you _sure_ you’re all right?” Shinra is asking for, like, the fiftieth time. Or maybe it’s only the fifth, Izaya isn’t too sure. The downside of all the coffee he’s been drinking is that he’s been having trouble focusing. At least it’s keeping him up – anything is better than sleeping at the moment.

“Fine, I’m fine Shinra,” Izaya waves a jittery hand. He thinks this is supposed to be an intervention. Maybe. Namie had been extremely annoyed when she kicked him out of his own apartment a few hours ago, and he’s pretty sure that it was because of the shaking. “Everything is absolutely peachy keen.”

He goes to take a drink from his cup only to remember that it’s empty. Izaya decides it’s better to focus on that rather than how his hands are shaking.

“Ah, is there more coffee?” He smiles at Shinra, who gets up before Izaya can stand to look for himself.

“I think you’ve had enough,” Shinra says, taking his cup from him, but he disappears into the kitchen nonetheless. Izaya feels a brief flair of victory in his chest, and when Shinra reappears in the doorway Izaya’s already making grabby hands for the cup. He doesn’t have a problem, he doesn’t, even if he feels betrayed when Shinra holds the cup out of his reach.

“I’ll give you the coffee,” There’s a catch, and Izaya realizes he should have gotten up and got the cup himself. “If you answer one question for me.”

“I’m not desperate enough that I’ll let you have a pint of Shizu-chan’s blood for a cup of coffee,” Izaya responds, because it’s a logical request of Shinra’s, and Izaya doesn’t want to think of what the real question is.

“While I’m glad to see you haven’t sunk so low as to selling your boyfriend’s blood to feed your addiction, that is not my question.” Shinra laughs, and drops into the chair across from Izaya, the cup tantalizingly out of his reach. “Why aren’t you sleeping?”

And there it is.

“What do you mean?” Izaya lies, narrowing his gaze on the coffee cup, not looking at Shinra. If he looks at Shinra it’s as good as admitting defeat. “Of course I’ve been sleeping. All I’ve been doing is sleeping, I’ve been sleeping so much –”

“All right!” Shinra interrupts him, far too cheerful and Izaya finds himself feeling crankier by the second. “Something to remember: you absolutely can _not_ lie while sleep deprived, or hopped up on what I’m guessing is at _least_ two dozen cups of coffee. Seriously, how is your heart even still beating?”

“I’m fine,” Izaya insists and leans over the coffee table for, surprise, surprise, his _coffee_. “Who cares if I haven’t been sleeping? It’s not harming anyone.”

“Shizuo would care,” Shinra points out, eliciting a scowl from Izaya. “If he knew, that is. After all, according to my darling you two haven’t spoke at all since he left.”

“I’ve been busy,” Izaya defends, not wanting to share the real reason. “I haven’t had a chance to call, and it’s not like he’s tried calling me.”

Shinra stares at him like he’s an idiot, and Izaya feels distinctly as if he’s being judged.

“Right…” Shinra says, setting the cup on the end table next to the chair he’s sitting in. Izaya thinks he’d look too desperate if he tried lunging for it.

“Look,” Shinra does that lean forward, putting a concerned look on his face as if he’s actually worried for Izaya, and not doing this because his headless mistress was worried about Izaya’s boyfriend. “Why are you avoiding Shizuo?”

“I’m not avoiding him!” He is, indeed, avoiding Shizuo.

“He’s barely been gone a _week_ ,” Shinra points out, and Izaya doesn’t need the reminder of how much of a pathetic wreck he’s been turned into in such a short amount of time. “And you haven’t talked to him at all. Something’s going on, Izaya.”

“Nothing’s going on,” Izaya informs Shinra. “So I haven’t been sleeping well, so I haven’t been talking to my boyfriend – that doesn’t mean there’s something wrong. What it means is that nosy busybodies who have nothing better to do are trying to micromanage my relationship because they feel unsatisfied with their own and because they’re bored and unsatisfied they’re imagining problems where there aren’t any because everything is just fine between us because of course everything is fine because it’s not like we spent the past eight years or so actively trying to kill one another so there’s not any reason either of us would be afraid that the other would just quit because this relationship obviously isn’t going to work out. Everything is fine, Shinra. Just _fine._ ”

Some niggling part of Izaya’s mind tells him that he said a little too much and should have stopped while he was ahead. The grin, slowly growing on Shinra’s face, doesn’t help things.

“So _that’s_ what’s been bothering you.” Izaya doesn’t like that grin on Shinra’s face.

“Izaya,” He reaches over and sets a hand on Izaya’s shaking knee. “It’s all right to be nervous about your relationship. These feelings are completely normal – it means you actually care about Shizuo.”

He doesn’t think Shinra understands though. Not the crippling panic that overwhelms him every time he shuts his eyes. Shinra doesn’t hear the phantom voice echoing through his head informing him that his relationship is doomed to fail. That chronic voice that sounds _just like_ Shizuo’s informing Izaya, _“Me and you? We’re simply not cut out for this lovers thing”_

It terrifies him more than he wants to admit. Than he’s willing to admit.

“Interesting!” Shinra has the look of the cat who just got the cream, and Izaya belatedly realizes that he just said all of that aloud. Maybe he should stop drinking coffee. It’s obviously causing him to make horrible decisions. “Who would have thought you’d have insecurities like that Izaya!”

“Just give me the coffee already,” Izaya sighs in resignation, hoping that Shinra won’t press the issue.

Surprisingly, Shinra hands over the cup without complaint, and Izaya takes a drink, hoping that the now-lukewarm coffee will take away some of the shakes he is starting to feel from the caffeine withdrawal.

“All right,” Shinra agrees, and passively watches as Izaya drinks the coffee like he’s a man dying of thirst. Something seems off about this cup, but Izaya doesn’t put two and two together until he’s over halfway through the cup and Shinra continues on with, “But don’t think we aren’t going to continue this conversation when you wake up!”

“What?” It takes him almost a full minute to understand the words that came from Shinra’s mouth, and then another thirty seconds and an overwhelming dizzy spell to understand the implications.

“I hate you,” Are the last words that pass through his lips, before he falls into a drugged sleep, thanks to Shinra.

Shinra just laughs, walking around the coffee table to pick up Izaya’s legs and haul them onto the couch.

“Say that after I save your relationship!”

* * *

 


End file.
